


in camera

by alwaysbuddy



Category: Law & Order: SVU
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Casual Sex, Explicit Sexual Content, Late Night Conversations, M/M, S17 E14: "Nationwide Manhunt", S17 E15: "Collateral Damages", S17 E16: "Star-Struck Victims", S17 Spoilers, Self-Doubt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-02
Updated: 2016-03-02
Packaged: 2018-05-24 08:05:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6147142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alwaysbuddy/pseuds/alwaysbuddy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mike Dodds makes a few bad decisions, or a few bad decisions make him. Your pick.</p><p>Either way, one more isn't going to hurt.</p>
            </blockquote>





	in camera

**Author's Note:**

> This happened. I'm still trying to like Dodds more, so this was sort-of an attempt to make that speed up. It's kinda working.
> 
> Spoilers for the last three episodes of S17.

He’d thought that after years of growing up in an environment where everything around him has been artfully and masterfully placed in order to push him into being a harder person, he’d be used to it—getting hurt, that is. 

But if he’s being honest with himself, getting shot isn’t what stings the most.

It’s the fact that he gets shot, _then_ has his explicit orders disobeyed by a lower-ranking, out-of-jurisdiction officer, and is then left behind, aching and blurry with pain while he bleeds sluggishly through the fingers that are clamped over the laceration in his arm.

Far off in the distance, multiple shots ring out, one after the other. 

Mike swears under his breath, and reaches for his walkie. “More shots fired,” he says steadily, the crackle-snap of the radio flaring up once more. “I repeat, requesting immediate back-up.”

He lies low by the door of the cruiser until he hears footsteps closing in, just on the heel of sirens wailing in the near vicinity. _Figures,_ thinks Mike, raising his firearm with his good arm as much as he can, before catching sight of who’s making those footsteps. Of course back-up would get here at the same time Detective Lindsay returns from her little vengeance spree.

“Dodds,” Lindsay says, lowering her weapon, “Yates—he’s in a truck, drove off into the woods, he’s going back to Chicago—he left a message, on a body—”

“Body? Who else was with him?”

Lindsay’s face furrows, probably in shock. “There was a residence there, occupied.” Mike’s stomach sinks. “Yates shot the father. The little girl is still in the house, hiding.”

“God,” Mike mutters, and he hisses, a sudden shift in movement causing the injury to throb even more than it had before. He’s lost a fair amount of blood despite the fact that the bullet only nicked him, he realises, as the blinding lights of the patrol cars and buses swim into view. “Shit,” he sighs, letting go of his arm, glancing at the way his entire sleeve is soaked through, staining the dark fabric even darker.

“Dodds, hold on,” Lindsay is saying, and he shakes his head, clearing his thoughts. He’s going to be fine, he’s fine, it’s just his arm, and he’s telling this to the paramedics that rush up to him, but they get him on a stretcher anyway and wheel him into the ambulance.

He’s never been in the back of an ambulance before. Guess tonight’s a real night for firsts.

 

 

The injury isn’t terrible. It’s not life-threatening, for one, and Mike’s awful glad for that. He’s lucky it hadn’t gone an inch to the left, or even a couple more, or he’d really be out of here. Rehab’s going to be a bitch, though, and that’s something he’s not looking forward to. Though, being able to move his arm without feeling like his entire shoulder is about to pop off would be pretty nice.

The rest of the squad finds him as they’re patching him up, hooked up to a drip that’s clearing the pain from his head, and easing him out of some of the tense resentment that he’s been harbouring since Detective Lindsay went rogue on him in the dark.

“Dodds, hey.” Benson’s voice is soothing, as she places her hand on his good shoulder carefully. It’s the same voice she uses with victims. He knows he should probably be a little irritated by that, her treating him with kid gloves. He isn’t, though—it’s coming out of a good place. He’s aware of that. “Gave us a real scare, there. How is it?”

“Nothing a couple of weeks of P. T. can’t fix.” 

She nods, and the others shuffle into view. Rollins’ face is set in something much like a grimace. Carisi’s standing just over her shoulder. “Rest up,” Benson says, “Fin and I are catching the next flight out to assist Chicago PD with the investigation. Rollins and Carisi will hold down the fort.”

“Got it,” Mike says, much more tired than he’d been when the night began. All he wants to do, if he’s being honest with himself, is take a very long nap. He thinks he might just do that right now, since they’re not letting him out for a little while more. “Thanks, Lieutenant.”

Benson smiles, a last time, before heading off. Rollins follows on her heels, but Carisi lingers by the doorway.

“Carisi,” Mike acknowledges, as the nurse finishes up, and leaves to attend to another patient. “You’re not going back to the precinct?”

Carisi looks a little amused. “Well, unless you want me to leave you here, since you can’t really drive ‘n all, right now.”

“Right,” Mike says, wondering if the drugs have caused his common sense to cease functioning too. “Thanks.”

“S’alright.” Carisi takes a seat by the cot. “I volunteered, in case you were wondering.”

“Good man.” Mike leans back, and shuts his eyes for a moment. Just a quick kip.

Carisi’s voice is uncharacteristically soft. “I’ll wake you up in a few.”

Mike makes a sound that could be assent, but he slips into sleep too soon to know.

 

 

He spends a week working through the pain, and then the inability to raise his arm above shoulder-level, and then by the second week, manages to regain almost all of his former mobility without more than a twinge. It’s probably thanks to the life-lessons in toughening-up his father’s drilled into him his whole life. 

Perks of being raised by a police officer, and eventually becoming one yourself.

Yates is killed, and Rudnick goes back to jail. It’s not quite the ending he wishes it’d had, with more casualties than anyone could’ve seen coming, but it’s the end of Gregory Yates, and that’s that.

It’s a slow couple of weeks, while he recovers. The unit is busier than ever, with the recent influx of cases, and he wishes he’d been there to back them up. It’s just one of those things that nobody can believe has happened until they’re staring it right in the eye and Hank Abraham is pleading guilty to being in possession of hardcore child pornography in front of a court-room filled with people who have known him for days and months and years.

Just two days till he’s back on active duty, now.

Mike sits at the counter in his apartment, nursing a beer, and avoiding his mobile phone like it’s the plague. _Five-year plan,_ his father’s voice echoes in his head, _a stepping stone._ Just another stair to climb on his way to the top. Get shot, and then get back in the field, and hopefully not get shot again while he tries to impress whomever he needs to impress in order to go further.

The task-force number he’s supposed to get in touch with is dialed and ready. He hasn’t touched the phone since then. Instead, he’d left it on the counter, cracked open a beer, drank that, and opened another one before returning to where he’d originally been perched, staring at his phone.

Joint Terrorism. The thought of being on the task-force thrills him just the slightest. It’s a big gig. He knows that. His father knows that, and that’s why he’s been pushing him so hard for this. Get a leg up. Get his Lieutenant’s stripes, as his dad had said. Make his way up, like his dad has.

Mike reaches over, hesitating. 

He turns the phone off.

The sound of the news accompanies the rest of his drink. They’re still running news on the case, talking about Hank, and talking about his wife and kids. Talking about his acquaintances, the people he shared an office with, the things he might have or might not have done. Talking. That’s all there is to it, really.

He watches absently until it switches into sports news, and then he turns it off, too.

 

 

Mike rubs at his face, running a palm across his jaw, and then his neck, and then back up across his forehead. He needs a haircut, he reckons, scrutinising himself in the mirror. It’s getting a little long in the front. 

Then again, it can probably wait.

He throws on the first clean shirt he finds, and a coat jacket over that, and heads off to the precinct, a lot less concerned with his appearance than he is about the fact that Bobby D’Amico’s bartender has just been accused of rape.

The whole thing goes down like a train-wreck. The girl ends up accusing not just his bartender, but Bobby himself, and Mike gets first-class seats to the hot mess that’s Rollins going undercover illegally, his father trying to keep things on the down-low as much as possible, and the girl’s own misstatements, time and time again.

He’s—he’s not too sure what to think, at first. He’s always had a gut feeling that Bobby D’s no better than some of the scum they pick off the streets sometimes, just better dressed and with a scrap of fancy paper from Yale framed on his wall. Knowing that he’s capable of rape—

It made him sick, watching them put their goddamned hands on Rollins, who’d indignantly gone and done what he’d said as a bare throwaway comment. It made him undeniably angry, knowing that they were going to walk, and that a young girl was crying in front of a court-room, and that there was nothing they could do about it.

Mike’s fingers skate across the touch-pad of his laptop, stopping for a moment.

Nothing they could do about it.

He clicks send.

 

 

When he leaves Lieutenant Benson’s office, his heart is pounding in his chest, terribly reminiscent of how he’d felt when he’d gotten shot, except this time he figures it might be his career that’s just had a hole put through it. 

He walks past everyone else in the squad room, not looking at them, and lets his feet take him straight to the room with the bunks. It’s usually empty, this time of night, and he sits on the edge of the furthest from the door, his back facing the little window in the wall. He rests his elbows on his knees and runs his hands through his hair, exhaling.

It was a stupid move. It was a stupid move, but it felt right, and it’ll at least bring attention to what that scumbag’s really like, and he really shouldn’t be this conflicted about it—but he’d thrown his morals right out the door when he’d clicked on that button, and all he can think about now is what his father would say if he ever knew.

He knows what Deputy Chief Dodds would say. What his father would say, now, that’s another story.

Untraceable, he reminds himself. Completely untraceable.

“Hey.” 

Mike lifts his head, dropping his hands to his sides. “Yeah, Carisi?”

Carisi’s standing at the door, expression unfathomable. “Just making sure you weren’t dying on us again or anythin’,” he says, and Mike raises an eyebrow. “You good to finish the day?”

“Yeah, I—yeah.” Mike stands, and pulls himself together, straightening his collar and fixing his tie that he’d loosened earlier. He walks over to the door, and nods at Carisi, who just looks back at him, face still something that he can’t read. “Thanks. But I’m fine.”

Carisi follows after him without a word, and settles back at his desk as if nothing’s happened.

It’s strange, though. Mike’s good at reading people. It’s a skill he’d picked up after realising that everything was politics, and nothing wasn’t. It was handy to know what someone’s face meant as they were talking to you. Were they lying? Were they just telling you what you wanted to hear?

Carisi’s one of the easiest to catch, usually. He’s one of the more animated people Mike has met at the precinct, and throws smiles around like traffic wardens hand out parking tickets. Today, he seems—pensive, almost. Some kind of ruminative that Mike can’t pinpoint.

Mike walks into the pantry, pours himself a cup of coffee, and downs it. Back to work, he reminds himself soberly. There’s a stack of papers on his desk calling his name, just waiting to be filled in and filed.

He buries himself in reports in an attempt to avoid meeting anybody’s eyes for the next couple of hours, and it nearly works. Rollins had left sometime after her explosive meeting with Benson, and Benson herself had taken an early night. She deserves one. She’s had enough happen over the past week to honestly need a night away from her squad.

He almost doesn’t realise that one other person is there, until Carisi’s voice comes, “Come on,” and he glances up to see Carisi grabbing his jacket off the back of his chair. “I’m buying you a drink.”

Mike’s at a loss for words for a moment. “Excuse me?”

“You’ve been staring at the same piece of paper for half an hour,” Carisi points out, “and I’m a hundred percent sure that neither of us need to be here. Everyone else’s left. You look terrible.” Carisi repeats, his accent stretching out the vowels, “I’m buying you a drink.”

“Yeah?” Mike looks at his desk, and considers the work that isn’t going anywhere, the dim little desk-light, the laptop that’s out of battery. He looks back up, and considers some semblance of conversation, a place without any of the tension that’s in the air, the cool clink of glass.

An officer slaps a ticket onto his windshield and salutes him. Carisi smiles, bright and hopeful, and Mike makes up his mind pretty quickly after that.

 

 

Carisi walks them through the cold to a cosy-looking place, a little bar he hadn’t realised existed, somewhere off the corner some blocks away from the precinct. “Less cops in this place. I mean, I don’t mind the NYPD bar, but it’s always packed to the walls,” he explains, ushering Mike into the warmth of the dimly-lit bar. There aren’t many patrons, just one or two seated at booths, and a few more along the bar-top. Light jazz is playing from the speakers in the corner. Carisi takes note of that, perking up when he hears it. “Mumbles,” he says appreciatively, “love this one.”

“Oscar Peterson Trio and Clark Terry,” Mike says, and Carisi’s head swivels in his direction. “It’s a ‘65 recording in Helsinki.” He smiles, a little abashedly, at the impressed look Carisi’s giving him. “I watched a lot of YouTube when he passed.”

“Great man,” Carisi says fondly, “hadn’t thought you’d be a fan of jazz.”

Mike understands that. He doesn’t think the rest of the squad actually know anything about him at all, besides his name. “It’s a secret,” he says lightly, “don’t give it away.”

They seat themselves at the very end of the counter. Carisi calls them two beers, and then tells Mike to call him something else. “Nobody calls me Dominick. Or Dom. That’s my dad. And we had a Nick.” He hands Mike one of the beers, and tips his in Mike’s direction. “’Sides, we’ve been working together half a year, haven’t we?”

Six months. Huh. It’s really been that long already. Then again, six months isn’t long. It’s still enough for his father to consider SVU just another ball to pitch on the way to the big leagues. 

Mike clinks his bottle against Carisi’s, and says, “You know, I don’t think I’ve heard my first name since Benson introduced me to the squad.”

“Ah. We’ll have to fix that, then.” Carisi—no, Sonny, takes a swig of his beer, and leans a little closer. “So, Mike. Anti-Crime, huh? What was that like?”

“Wasn’t much.” Mike taps his fingers along the counter. It really hadn’t been much—most of the time, he had just been sitting in a nondescript vehicle, waiting for someone to pull out a bag somewhere from behind a jacket. “You really wanna know?”

Sonny shrugs. “Anything to get you talking.”

So, Mike does. He talks about what the job had been like, and tells a couple of stories about some too-adventurous detectives he’d known then who had messed up big time and gotten themselves demoted, and talks a bit more about the kind of people he’d ran into while working the streets, and talks until he’s well into his second drink.

In turn, Sonny tells him about the time he’d spent shuffling between bureaus, trying to find some kind of footing, and finally tripping into SVU with a little less finesse than he’d hoped for. “But it’s good,” he says, nodding. “You get used to it. The people. I know you weren’t here, but the squad—they’re all good people.”

“I know they are.” Mike finishes his drink, and calls another round. Sonny’s arm is warm against his; they’d scooted closer as the bar began to fill up, with more people coming into the bar as the hour goes by, but Mike doesn’t feel like moving in the slightest. It’s the most he’s spoken to anyone on the team since he arrived here. “I know,” he repeats. 

Sonny casts a contemplative eye on him. “It’s tough,” he says, “being the new guy. I know. Trust me.” Sonny smiles a little, and sips at his bottle. “Pretty sure they were all ready to boot me by the end of the first week. Nearly put in an application for a transfer, at some point. But you learn, and it gets easier.”

Mike looks away, and traces the reflection of the lights across the counter-top glass. “I might,” he starts, and Sonny looks at him, inquiring. “Transfer out.” Might transfer out. Mike internally scoffs. He’d sat at a bar, exactly like this one, and listened to his father basically tell him that it wasn’t an option. There aren’t words like _‘might’_ or _‘maybe’_ or _‘perhaps’_ in his father’s vocabulary. Only _‘do’_ and _‘will.’_ “There’s a spot on Joint Terrorism.”

Sonny whistles. “Really?” 

“Yeah.”

“Wow.” Sonny nods. “High profile. I get why you’d want to.”

Mike laughs, a little hollow. “I’m not even sure if I do, actually.” At Sonny’s expression, he continues, “My dad thinks that SVU’s just a stepping stone on my way up. But SVU—” He pauses, trying to find the right word. “It’s—different. It’s not Anti-Crime. It’s not Joint Terrorism. It’s not any other unit.”

Sonny’s next words are sedate, as if he’s thought about them as many times as Mike’s thought about whether the unit’s the right one for him. “You meet real people,” he starts, “you talk to them, and you find out their stories, and you tell them that you’re going to help them, and you do. You see them smile for the first time since you met ‘em, in a hospital room, or interrogation, or on the streets. You fight for them, and you see them fight back.” He takes a long swig, and exhales hard. “I said I worked Homicide, right?”

“You did.”

“You can’t do that, there. You can’t save the dead. All you can do is remember them, and help other people do the same by giving them closure.” Sonny leans in, the bar momentarily picking up in noise when a small outfit of people walk through the door. His breath is warm against Mike’s cheek. “Anyway, I’d be pretty darn sad to see you go.”

“You wouldn’t,” Mike says. “I keep making bad decisions. But I’m going to ask anyway: why?”

“Amanda’s just starting to get used to you. Sticking up for her, sticking it _to_ her.” Sonny huffs a little laugh, and his knee knocks gently against Mike’s under the counter. “Lemme guess, it can’t be traced?”

It’s starting to feel a little hot in here. Mike curls a finger into the knot of his tie, and loosens it further. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Sonny levels him with a knowing look. “Amanda didn’t drop that video. And I’m not stupid.”

Mike drinks, and then matches his gaze. “Benson already knows.”

“Of course she does,” Sonny acknowledges, and the words are said with regard. “You weren’t in that office just now for nothin’.” His tone dips, and falls softer. Mike doesn’t even have to strain to hear them; they’re sitting so close together now, that it’s almost ridiculous how Mike can almost count all the creases in his lower lip. “You’re a good man, Mike Dodds.”

The noise level drops, but neither of them move from where they are. 

“I’d say the same about you,” Mike says, and he lets his knee rest against Sonny’s this time, when they bump again. “Dominick Carisi.”

Sonny’s lips quirk up in a smile. “Sonny,” he says, and Mike thinks absently, _you’re absolutely right, it is unquestionably sunny in here, not because of the bar-lights, but because you won’t stop smiling at me._ “Hey, Mike? Tell me I’m not reading this all wrong.”

Mike’s beer is down to its final dregs. “Probably not.”

It’s been too long. He could blame the alcohol, he could blame the heat from the lights placed around the bar. He could blame the apartment he goes back to at night, small and bare and made for one person and just one. 

He’s a lonely man. You can’t blame him for yearning (but you can’t blame anything else around him, either).

And Sonny Carisi is looking at him, not like he’s seeing something new for the first time, but like he’s considering everything that he’s already seen, over the past six months and more. The man he’s just spent two or so hours conversing with, the man whose arm is pressed up against his without even the slightest bit of unease.

It doesn’t hurt that he’s easy on the eyes. Very much so.

Sonny drains his bottle, tipping it back until the last swills of amber have disappeared, and places it gently on the counter. He slips off the bar-stool with a strange sort-of grace, getting to his feet easily, without any of that usual fumbling. “I’m going home,” he says, meeting Mike’s gaze head-on, “you coming along?”

There’s a promise tucked away somewhere in the back of those words, in the back of that smile that isn’t quite a smile, more like a slight upward tilt to mark some hidden curiousity that Mike feels reflected under his own skin, burning up his fingertips even as the chilled glass bottle in his hand reminds him that the world still exists around them, loud and booming and unknowing.

Mike downs his beer, setting it down beside Sonny’s with just a bit of nervous edge. “Lead the way,” he says, voice a little hoarse, and Sonny’s hand brushes the side of his when he moves to follow him out of the bar. 

 

 

Sonny’s flat isn’t too far from the precinct, and because of that, not too far away from the bar either, so they walk a short distance. Mike isn’t too sure how he makes it there without speaking; his nerves are shot to hell, even though he’s sure he looks just as composed as he always is. That’s also something you pick up, doing this line of work. Pretending. You get good at pretending.

“It’s a bit of a mess,” Sonny says, opening the door, and Mike blinks when he steps in, because that isn’t a mess. “Sorry ‘bout that.”

“Sonny,” Mike says, “you’ve got two books open on a table. That’s not a mess. This is the cleanest flat I’ve ever seen in my life.”

“Ah, well, I—um.” Sonny sounds embarrassed. “I’m a bit of a, uh—I clean a lot, when I’m at home.”

“Huh,” Mike says, and that’s where the conversation drops. It’s the exact moment that Mike realises that he’s standing in Sonny’s apartment, barely one step past the door, and Sonny is looking at him the same way he had been, over the bar-counter, barely fifteen minutes ago.

God. Mike suddenly and terrifyingly just _wants._

“You reconsidering?” Sonny asks, hesitant.

Mike locks the door behind him, and leans back against it. “Probably not,” he answers, and he smiles, just as hesitantly. “Hey. Come here.” 

Sonny closes the gap, one step, two, and then he’s pressing Mike back against the door, kissing him. His mouth is warm against Mike’s, and the feel of it makes Mike want to chase the taste that’s probably on his tongue, the slight tang of alcohol and coffee. They’re about the same height, but Sonny is just an inch taller, and he dips down to bite on Mike’s lower lip, something playful.

Mike reaches out, runs his palms across Sonny’s shoulders, pushing his tan coat off and onto the floor. He’s broad, despite how lanky he is. Sonny does the same, tugging at Mike’s lapels until he slips it off, letting it drop beside Sonny’s. Their ties follow, a moment after.

One of Sonny’s hands braces itself against the door, the other splayed across Mike’s collar, and it makes Mike shudder, just the slightest. The thought of Sonny holding him down.

A heartbeat, and then Sonny is licking into his mouth leisurely, like he has all the time in the world to spare, and not just a single night with someone who’s just as aware as he is of how many hours they have before duty calls again. 

He hasn’t kissed another man since he was in his twenties, and in his early twenties, at that. A couple of throwaway, one-night stands. Just flings, like this. He doesn’t quite recall, though, the act of kissing being this satisfying. Being this _good._

The wet press of lips together, slick and hot and unbearably pleasure-inducing. Sonny’s palms, burning straight through the thin fabric of his shirt and searing imprints into his skin. Mike wants both their shirts off, and to run his own hands across the expanse of that body.

“Been wanting to do this for a while,” Sonny whispers, pulling back to press a kiss to Mike’s jaw, and then down his neck, and then against the base of his throat. Mike tugs him back up, and kisses him hard, feeling electric when Sonny’s knee presses up between his legs.

“Yeah?” Mike’s fingers curl into Sonny’s belt-loops, and tug him nearer. He can feel how hard Sonny is, the length of him pressing against his thigh. “How long?”

“A while.”

They end up kissing for a long time, just standing there trading breaths back and forth. Mike learns every possible angle Sonny’s mouth can slot against his, until they’re both forced to pull away, panting. Sonny’s mouth is the loveliest shade of red he’s ever known, and Mike wants that mouth on him in every other possible place, too.

“Bed,” Mike says, the word coming out in a half-breath, tumbling off his lips, and Sonny pulls them both away from the door, stepping past discarded pieces of fabric and furniture to stumble to the bedroom. They make quick work of each other’s clothes along the way, tripping onto Sonny’s bed with Sonny on his back and Mike over him.

The next few minutes are absent of words. The bed creaks with their weight; Mike straddles Sonny’s waist and lets Sonny look him over, eyes skirting across skin attentively. He finally says, “I’d ask if you work out, but I’m pretty sure that’s a given.” His fingers skim upwards along his wrist, the inside of his elbow, coming up to trace the scar from the bullet wound, a white line that doesn’t seem like it’ll be disappearing anytime soon. “Your arm?”

“Doesn’t hurt.” 

“Right,” Sonny says, and he motions, “switch with me.” At Mike’s confused look, he tacks on, “you, lie down.”

“I’m—”

“—gonna watch me fuck myself on your cock.” 

_“Jesus,”_ Mike says thickly, a little taken aback and incredibly turned on, and Sonny grins at him. “You don’t talk like that on the job.”

They take a moment to shift around; Mike lying where Sonny had been, ripping open a foil packet with his teeth, and Sonny with his knees on either side of his waist, already slicking his fingers up with the lube he’d grabbed from some nefarious drawer. He has a nice cock, Mike thinks absently, distracted by the way Sonny slides his fingers into himself, just stretching himself out enough to be able to take him after.

It isn’t long until Sonny is bracing himself against the headboard, shifting down carefully, testing just how much he can take, until his hands shake.

“You good?” 

“Stay still,” breathes Sonny, eyes shut. His tone slips, pitching higher. “ _Ah_ —god.” Mike’s hands curl around Sonny’s hips, even as he slowly slips down onto Mike’s cock. It’s already tight. The sheets are slick, slippery with lube, and all Mike knows is the heat that he pushes up into when Sonny lowers himself back down again, palms almost slipping, fingertips curling into the mattress. 

There’s a another pause, and Sonny’s knees slide apart slightly more, allowing him to sink down deeper, and Mike has to take a moment to breathe, or risk coming right there on the spot. He nearly comes undone with those few inches, every last whit of pleasure igniting under his skin.

“Sonny,” he says, not even sure if he’s even saying the right word, and Sonny rolls his hips against Mike’s, making him groan inadvertently. His hand finds one of Sonny’s, and grips it tight, as Sonny leans down to catch Mike’s mouth in a messy kiss, all tongue and haste and just something to help them both hold on while Mike thrusts up against Sonny too, all staccato-rhythm and uncoordinated pacing.

His other hand goes to Sonny’s cock, palming it until Sonny looks wrecked, on the verge of coming, face flushed red as he says, “Come on—harder.” His fingernails curl into Mike’s shoulders, leaving half-moons in his skin. 

Mike comes first, like a punch in the chest, and Sonny follows soon after.

He can’t remember the last time he’d felt this sated. Mike feels Sonny roll off and flop onto his back, lying beside Mike. “Not bad,” he says, and Sonny laughs, free-form and tired in the best way. 

“That a compliment?”

“Take it or leave it.”

The air comes back to him. He re-positions himself a little, glancing over at Sonny, who seems to be considering something. 

“Y’know,” Sonny says suddenly, pulling himself up from the bed, “I’m thinking... shower?”

Mike raises a brow. “Big enough for two?”

Sonny’s smile is brazen. “We can make it work.” 

 

 

He’d kissed someone in the rain once. It was wet, and cold, and they’d both been shivering so hard their teeth had clacked together when they moved their heads closer instead of their mouths meeting. He hadn’t ever done it again, after.

This isn’t anything like that. 

The tiles are the only thing that’s cold, but that only lasts a couple of seconds. Sonny turns the water on full blast, and the temperature high enough to make the entire bathroom steam up. The heat soaks into his bones, resting him on his feet.

Lines and angles. Mike reaches out, kissing the shell of Sonny’s ear, and thumbing over the curve of his hip. It’s what makes most men attractive, all hard planes and firmness, and this isn’t any different. He’s all lean and long-limbs that Mike had ran his mouth all over.

The water runs down, collecting in their lashes, in the hollows of their clavicles. Mike leans back against the wall, and watches as the indoor rainstorm washes away all traces of the long day. Sonny’s hair is scrubbed free of product, and it falls soft around his face, against his forehead. It makes him look ten years younger. Like the young man he probably was when he still entertained dreams of becoming a detective, all the way back in the beginning.

Lines and angles, those are true, but there’s something about the way water makes a person look fluid, softer, more pliant. There’s just something about it.

He kisses Sonny in the rain. It is wet, and hot, and the only reason they shiver is because Mike runs his teeth along Sonny’s lower lip and sucks the water right off his tongue while Sonny’s fingers bruise memories into Mike’s skin.

He does it again.

 

 

He wakes to the unfamiliar sight of turquoise curtains, fluttering in the slight breeze.

Mike rolls over onto his back, and stares up at an unfamiliar ceiling too. Then, he takes proper stock of his surroundings, and recalls the previous night. He’d fallen asleep in Sonny’s bed, one arm draped across Sonny’s front. 

Unsurprisingly, he hasn’t slept this well in ages. 

“Morning,” Sonny’s voice comes, a low rumble, and Mike looks over to see Sonny with eyes opening, still in the prelude of awakening. The light shining through the gaps in the curtains is enough to illuminate Sonny’s face. “What time ‘sit?”

“Morning.” They’re both used to waking up at the crack of dawn, Mike supposes. But they’re not expected in till nine today. Unexpected blessings. “It’s five.”

Beside him, Sonny yawns and stretches, before turning to press a kiss to Mike’s bare shoulder. “Awesome,” Sonny murmurs, and he presses his face back against the pillows. “Don’t think I can even stand up right now.” He turns his face up, just as Mike moves closer, and they find themselves face-to-face.

Sonny laughs, voice scratchy, and Mike kisses him.

Another, and another, and another. A breath hitches, and the sheets rustle. Incalescence rushes through the senses. There’s a long, contented sigh, and the unfurling of toes.

The world spins out of view, and back again.

“Well,” Sonny murmurs, resting his head against Mike’s chest. “That was nice.”

“Which part?”

“All of it.”

 

 

The sunlight ebbs through the curtains, and a small square of light falls onto the bed. Sonny shifts a little, glancing over, and the spot of sun catches on the indent of his collarbones. “Guess I’m another one of your bad decisions, now,” he murmurs, half-teasing, half-deprecating.

Mike vaguely remembers saying that, when they’d been drinking. _I keep making bad decisions._ He’s not surprised that Sonny remembers. He’s starting to figure out that Sonny remembers all the things that people tend to forget, just so somebody won’t.

“Yes.” Mike thumbs over Sonny’s skin, where the light is making his skin glow. “You’re the only one I don’t regret.” _Yet._

Sonny huffs, the corner of his mouth quirking up, and he’s silent for a few moments. Mike wonders if he’s been too honest, until Sonny says, “You regret leaking the video?”

Ah. That’s what he’d caught from that. “Just enough to worry about my job.”

“You’ll be alright.” Sonny’s fingertips glide across his scar again. It seems to have become a real point of fascination for him. “I can’t see you being let go for somethin’ like that. ‘Sides,” he adds quietly, “I don’t wanna say it, but—”

“My father,” Mike finishes, “yeah. I know.”

Sonny shrugs, a loose-limbed motion. “He’s just looking out for you. S’what fathers do.”

Mike doesn’t reply to that. Instead, he slides his hand down Sonny’s front, and lets it rest on his waist. “I have to leave soon.”

Sonny hums. He doesn’t ask if Mike means leaving here, his tiny too-clean apartment, and the first ounce of company Mike’s had in a long time, or whether he means the unit, and the squad he’s still not sure has even warmed up to the idea of him yet. “You wanna do this again sometime?”

It’s so simple, the way he asks. Just a shared tumble into a warm bed. Warmer hands and the innate desire to just touch another man until he breaks apart under your hands. Mike hadn’t realised how much he’d missed this kind of contact until the thought of having to pry himself away from those nimble fingers crossed his mind.

“I wouldn’t be opposed to the idea,” Mike answers carefully, “as long as—”

“Listen, I have a lot more self-preservation than that,” Sonny cuts over him again, sounding just a little miffed, probably knowing the completely cliched thing he’d been about to say. Mike winces, knowing that it’s not the first time he’s grossly underestimated the man’s perception.

“Sorry,” Mike says, a little disconcerted. “It’s not—I wasn’t implying anything.”

“Yeah.” Sonny nods a few times. “I get you. An out cop? It’s practically career suicide.” The pause stretches out between them for just a little too long. “Family, too.”

Mike meets his eyes. Sonny doesn’t smile, but the way his mouth turns up is something sardonic, too cynical to belong there.

Then, he continues, “I fooled around with this guy, when we were in high-school. It wasn’t anything serious or nothin’, but we were friends. Then his parents found out he liked boys. They sent him away, to one of those camps—y’know, one of those pray-the-gay-away type camps?” At Mike’s nod, he goes on. “He came back after that and he... wasn’t the same anymore. We stopped talking after that, because he didn’t wanna come near me anymore. He didn’t go near any of his friends. It was scary.” Sonny shakes his head. “My family’s Catholic, totally devout—I know they’d never do anything like that, but. I was always just scared.”

“And now?”

Sonny glances away for a moment, and then looks back at him, steadfast. “I’m thirty-six,” he says, “not sixteen. Nobody’s gonna do anything to me unless I let them.”

Mike can believe that. “Wish I had your honesty.” He can’t remember the last time he’d been as honest as Sonny is. Maybe his ex-girlfriend from when he’d been in the Academy. Maybe his previous squadron leader, but even then, not like this.

“Nah, you wouldn’t.” Sonny’s tone is teasing. “I say way too much at all the wrong times.”

And he says so much at all the right times, too. Mike doesn’t say the words, but he brushes his fingers along Sonny’s hip and hopes he knows. “My family doesn’t know,” he says, “they’ll probably never know. They’re still waiting for me to settle down.” 

It's a secret. Don't give it away.

Sonny chuckles lightly. “You _are_ settling. At SVU.”

“Am I?” Mike recalls the tension, the disobeyed commands, the disagreements and the looks the others give him when they think he’s hiding behind his inherited authority figure. He really doesn’t think he is. One person in his corner doesn’t mean that the rest will come around.

“Hey. Give it some time.” Sonny shrugs. “Took me a year, y’know. I’m still sticking my foot in my mouth even now. But you start learning a whole lot faster, after a while. Just—hold off on it for now.”

Mike exhales. “Yeah. Maybe.”

They lapse into a comfortable silence, until their phones go off. It’s not yet seven-thirty, but they’ve just gotten a call they need to check up on. Sonny lends Mike a toothbrush, a change of clothes, and a tie. Mike pays for coffee on the way, and they both head up to the precinct.

Nothing else to it.

It’s still tense, when everyone gathers. Benson and Rollins are still on edge with each other, and Sonny’s attempting to bridge the gap between them, but not so much so that they call him out on it. Fin’s observing carefully, knowing better than to get in the middle of anything.

But the case comes first, and they’re fine with compartmentalising.

And Mike is fine with letting things roll, watching and waiting and learning when the right time to say the right thing is.

He feels a lot lighter than he has in a while. A weight’s been lifted, with the conversation and the company, from last night and this morning. Good words, the warmth of another body, and the kindness that comes with a smile. It hasn’t been this easy in a long while.

Maybe, not so bad a decision after all.

 

 

It comes back to this: a string of numbers, typed in and ready, on a brightly-lit screen. A name, a position, a future. A decision, good or bad. A path, a road, a staircase that never ends. Wanting to belong, wanting to move on. Learning. Fighting for other people, and watching them fight back.

 _My name is Sergeant Mike Dodds,_ he thinks, _I’m with the NYPD. Special Victims Unit._

He picks up the phone, and deletes the number.

Mike settles in, and starts over.


End file.
